Though I Do Not Know the Way
by positivelymeteoric
Summary: He hasn't told John this, but it's his aim to know everything about him, until he can describe the way that John's hair slides from blond to gray or the way that John laughs, warm and steady, when Sherlock does something he likes, as easily as he can rattle off the markers of time of death.


**This was for a prompt for the johnlockchallenges gift exchange, which was: Sherlock and John reading together. Enjoy!**

* * *

It's ridiculous, really. Bizarre, even.

It's Sunday and 221B is sleepy and quiet, the living room diffused with warm late afternoon sunlight that slides across the floor like lace. John's sitting in his chair, legs stretched out over the carpet, a paperback pinched between his fingers. The sunlight makes his hair, blond mostly, but now mixed with coarse gray in places, seem almost golden.

Sherlock, perched up in his chair, all limbs and dark curls and sharp angles, watches him carefully as he turns the pages, his own book lying open and abandoned in his lap.

_Reads approximately 315 words a minute_, he notes._ Above average for the adult male._

John, he thinks, is above average in many respects.

As John turns the page, he chuckles once, softly, to himself.

"What?" Sherlock asks, afraid for a moment that he's been caught out staring.

"Nothing," John says, not once looking up from the pages at Sherlock. Unacceptable. "Haven't read this since I was a kid, is all. Nostalgia and all that."

At this, Sherlock is interested. He hasn't told John this, but it's his aim to know everything about him, until he can describe the way that John's hair slides from blond to gray or the way that John laughs, warm and steady, when Sherlock does something he likes, as easily as he can rattle off the markers of time of death.

"May I?" he asks, plucking the book from John's hand.

"You know," John says, rising and stretching and heading towards the kitchen. "There's not much of a point in asking if you're just going to take it regardless."

Sherlock doesn't dignify this with a response. Instead, he's focused on what John had been last reading.

He skims the page. He stops. Then, unbelieving, he skims again.

"This is ridiculous," he mutters. Then he repeats it again, loud enough that John can hear him in the kitchen.

"What is?" John's reply is nearly drowned out by the sound of the water running from the tap.

"This," he says, waving the book in his hands. "All this wizards and elves nonsense."

John emerges from the kitchen, leans with his hip against the doorframe. For a moment, Sherlock thinks he's angry, but his tone is light, teasing.

"I'll have you know that the Fellowship of the Ring is most definitely not ridiculous." He snatches the book back from Sherlock's hands and makes his way back towards the kitchen.

Sherlock snorts.

"Are you twelve years old, John?"

"Oh, sod off." It's affectionate, half of a laugh hidden behind it.

For someone so stubbornly ordinary, Sherlock finds John incredibly baffling at times.

The next day, while John's at work, Sherlock goes to the bookstore.

_It's a waste of time and money_, he tells himself, but he can't help it. It's another puzzle to solve, another small gain in the mystery of John Watson.

If it was important to John, then there was no way he could let it go uninvestigated.

He finds the book in the fantasy section, buys a nicer, newer copy than John's battered paperback. He ignores the shopkeeper's goodbyes on his way out.

He finds a bench in Regent's Park and pulls the book out of the shopping bag, turning it over carefully in his hands, holding it at arm's length as if it's something dirty. He's never really set much stock in fiction; what was the point of wasting time and brainpower on something that wasn't real, that had no practical benefit?

John, he knows, loves fiction. There's always a teetering stack of books to read by his bedside table, a few shoved in piles in the kitchen or the living room, thin battered paperbacks and glossy hardcovers cluttering up the flat. Sherlock would never admit it but he enjoys this, as if it's John's way of announcing his presence in the flat even when he wasn't there.

But John, ever sensible, ever practical, normally doesn't read fantasy; he sticks to thrillers or literary fiction or mysteries that Sherlock deduces the ending of. John always pretends to be mad after that, but they both knew the truth.

He flips over the cover, pinches the spine between two gloved fingers, flips through pages and pages of prologue and notes to find the first chapter.

_When Mr. Bilbo Baggins of Bag End announced that he would shortly be celebrating his eleventy-first birthday with a party of special magnificence, there was much talk and excitement in Hobbiton_.

He rolls his eyes. Ridiculous. Childish. He throws the book back into his bag, makes a mental note that he needs six pairs of socks as well as several severed feet for his current experiment. He doesn't want to use his; John's will do. He won't mind, he'll never mind, and that's one of the many small wonders of John.

Sherlock debates telling John about the book over dinner that night, but John's busy complaining about his latest abysmal date. This time, Sherlock's not even to blame, and he takes a bit of selfish delight in listening to John swear off ever dating again.

"I mean really," he says, waving his forkful of pasta around with dangerous enthusiasm. "At this point, I might as well just give up and marry _you._Everyone else around seems to think it's true."

Sherlock makes a noncommittal grunt, but he can feel the tips of his ears going a bit pink.

John, staying with him for the rest of his life rather than constantly insisting on wooing those insipid girls? He likes it more than words can say, wants it, needs it.

But John is straight and John is uninterested and it's better to keep what they have than to risk ruining it on a whim. He'll leave one day, find some girl who can tolerate him constantly running off with Sherlock, will marry her and leave him alone. He'll never be more than crime scenes and danger to him and it's inevitable and he knows it, resents it. _Don't tell him, don't tell him, don't tell him_, he repeats to himself.

And so he laughs and smiles and eats nearly a whole plate of pasta, which makes John happy.

That night Sherlock lies in bed, utterly exhausted but unable to sleep. He hates nights like these, the long stretches between cases, where his mind seems to be tearing itself to pieces, turning traitor on itself.

Giving up on sleeping that night, he gropes around in the darkness for his laptop, but instead brushes against the paperback book.

_Might as well_, he thinks begrudgingly as he flicks on his bedside lamp. He pushes himself up to a sitting position and flips open to where he had left off. It'll be ridiculous and dull and awful, but anything's better than lying awake in bed, letting his mind rip itself apart with boredom.

He shifts closer to the light and begins to read.

The moment that John leaves for work the next morning (can't give him the satisfaction of being right, he'll never shut up about it), Sherlock's off to the bookshop. He ignores the shopkeeper's chuckles as he waits for him to ring up his order, snatches the last two books from his hands and hails the first cab he sees. On the way home, he begins to read The Two Towers and doesn't notice that they've pulled up in front of 221B until the cabbie begins coughing pointedly.

He reads while he walks up the stairs, nearly tripping as he walks through the doorway over a pair of John's shoes lying on the floor, shuts his bedroom door behind him and sits down on his bed, book still clutched tight in his hand. Something that John had once said about how he never does anything by halves nags in the back of his mind but he ignores it.

His phone buzzes twice over the course of the day; he only checks to make sure it's not Lestrade with a case, but of course it's not.

_Can you check and see if we have milk? –J_

_Sherlock? –J_

He pretends not to have seen them in favor of staying glued to the page.

John comes home a few hours later; normally Sherlock can tell just how his day has gone by the sound of his footsteps, but today he doesn't even notice John's presence until there's a rap at the door.

"Sherlock?" he says. His voice is careful, slightly concerned. A good doctor, an even better friend. "Everything alright in there?"  
"Fine," he shouts back, not once looking up from the pages.

Sherlock's not sure what time he hears John's footsteps on the way up to his bedroom; it's sometime between The Two Towers and The Return of the King, he estimates. For the second night in a row, he stays up reading, finally turning the last page as the gray early morning sun begins to break over London.

He flops down across his bed, exhausted. He feels as if he's emerging from some strange sort of literary coma and he blinks up at the ceiling, trying to make sense of what's just happened.

God, he was an idiot. He understands now, can see why they're so popular, why John loves them.

John.

John will never let him hear the end of this, not after the way that Sherlock had ridiculed the books. He can't know, can never know; Sherlock needs to keep at least a _scrap _of his pride, seeing as he's already half mad over the man. So he stashes the books in his dresser, buries them carefully under layers of socks.

He smiles a bit at his handiwork and then gets ready to start his day.

It's not even an hour past breakfast when Sherlock's phone buzzes with a text from Lestrade. The case seems fairly simple: a woman found dead in an alleyway, her husband a man with crime family connections who owed several important people money. Easy. Open and shut. He texts John, who's at work, but there's no response and Sherlock presses his lips together in a tight, unhappy line as it becomes clear that he'll be going alone.

He stumbles tiredly back into the flat around midnight, a bruise forming on his face from where he was punched by the husband who had ended up being the murderer. John's nowhere to be seen, but there's a covered plate of something on the kitchen counter.

Underneath the paper towel is a bowl of the leftover pasta they had had two nights, a fork resting carefully on top. He can't help but smile at this, at the thought of John setting aside food for him, being worried for him.

His smile abruptly slides away when he sees what's tucked in the space between the bowl and the wall: his copies of The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers and The Return of the King, all neatly lined up next to each other.

"You know," comes John's voice from behind him. "Stealing all of my socks, which forces me to borrow yours, and then hiding something you didn't want me to find in your sock drawer wasn't exactly your brightest idea." He must've snuck into the kitchen when Sherlock wasn't looking, and is now leaning against the fridge, a triumphant grin on his face.

Sherlock says nothing, just gapes at him.

"You said they were ridiculous, if I'm remembering right," he says with a chuckle. "Wizards and elves and childish, you said. Why the sudden change of heart?"

Sherlock says nothing, not looking at John. He wonders if he could possibly slip out of the flat without John noticing.

He could've said anything, could've blamed it on curiosity or on a need to feel justified in his dismissal of them. But instead what comes out in a barely audible mutter is:

"I read them for you."

John stops, cocks his head to the side. He's not angry, but there's a wrinkle of confusion in his forehead.

"What?"

Sherlock swears underneath his breath. Now he's done it, and there's no other option but to tell him and John will leave. The thought of it is a barb of cold iron in his stomach.

"You heard me perfectly well. I won't repeat myself." He turns to sweep out of the kitchen and into his room, but John grabs his upper arm tight, fingers pressing in painfully.

"_Why?_" he asks, all the teasing gone from his voice. Sherlock tries his best to hold his gaze but has to break away, staring pointedly above John's head.

And before he can stop himself, he's babbling away.

"Because last week you said they were your favorites and I wanted to- no, I _needed_ to know why, because I need to know everything about you because maybe if I can memorize the color of your hair and why you love Lord of the Rings so bloody much, it'll be less painful when you inevitably leave."

The last few words come out in a tangle and John stares slackly at him. Sherlock realizes that his hands are trembling.

"Oh," John says, his voice so soft that Sherlock can barely hear him. This is it, he knows, and he braces himself for John's careful apology, for him brushing past him to go upstairs and pack a bag. John's kind, he knows. He won't make this any harder on Sherlock than it needs to be. He steels himself. "Oh. So you-"

"Yes," Sherlock says through gritted teeth. Why the hell is he dragging this out?

"Since-"

"From the start."

"And _me_-"

"Only you, you idiot."

John stares at him, and there's something soft and fond in his eyes.

"Oh," he says, his voice quiet and gentle. And then, "You are such a _bastard_."

And without warning John's standing up on tiptoe and carefully pressing his lips to Sherlock's.

John's lips are soft and warm and chapped on his, one callused hand resting lightly on the back of Sherlock's neck, the tips of his fingers just brushing the ends of his hair where it curled down.

Sherlock's not quite sure where to put his hands; they had been clenched in fists beforehand, instinctive, defensive, but now they're open, palms out, and he rests one tentatively on the small of John's back.

John pulls back until there's just enough space between them that they're no longer touching, though Sherlock can still feel John's breath on his face, his lips on his own. He feels a bit stupefied.

Sherlock's about to ask John what this all means, wants to know if he can allow himself just a bit of hope but before he can even open his mouth, John cuts him off with a laugh.

"How could you not know? You of all people, you wanker. I'm not leaving, I'm never leaving, not unless you make me. Idiot."

So that's that and there's something almost painfully bright and warm and it seems he's underestimated John twice today. Rather than answer his question, he leans in again to capture John's mouth with his own.

After that, they don't do much speaking.

* * *

Two weeks later, John comes home from work a little later than usual, a paper bag of takeaway balanced on one arm, a white plastic shopping bag looped around his wrist.

"Budge up," he says to Sherlock, who's stretched out on the couch, setting the takeaway down on the kitchen table and rustling around in the shopping bag. "I've got something for you."

Sherlock makes no efforts to move until something hard and plastic smacks him in the head. He picks it up in his hands, turns it over.

"A DVD?"

John makes his way into the living room with a container of lo mein for Sherlock and one of General Tso's for himself balanced in his hands. "Look at the title," he says around a laugh.

Sherlock does.

"Oh," he says. "I had no idea they made movies out of these."

"Somehow, I'm not surprised."

The sun begins to sink outside Baker Street and their food begins to grow cold in the containers on their laps. John's wrapped up in the film, whereas Sherlock spends most of it watching the way that the flickering light from the telly moves over John's face, washes it in the deep greens of the Shire and the intense reds and blacks of Mordor, a story played out across his skin.

There are words bubbling up in Sherlock's throat, too weighty for tonight, but soon, soon. He feels sure about them somehow, as if this will work, something that's built to last. The knowledge sits warm and heavy in his chest.

And so he stretches out against the couch and puts his head in John's lap, smiling faintly when he feels John's hand tangle a little in his hair. He knows it's all a little ridiculous, but then again so are he and John, and so that's alright.

And that's enough.


End file.
